Home School Life Journal

Around the World New Year's Eve Activity Bags (and Geography Review!)

All photos are from 2011.

A few years ago, I began a Around the World New Year's Eve tradition. I made up bags of fun out of ordinary paper lunch bags with times on them for each hour starting with 3:00 and going until 9:00, or bedtime by 9:30 for my youngest boys. Each bag was also labeled with a city in which it turned midnight when we opened the bag so we could celebrate New Year's Eve around the globe. We looked for the city before we enjoyed the activity. If you would like to pick your own cities, you can find them here.

At 2:00, we found Tehran, Iran and began playing board games.

At 3:00, we found Moscow, Russia and made Sherbet Mocktails out of lemon-lime soda with sherbet, served in plastic champagne glasses to make them festive.

At 4:00, we found Bagdad, Iraq and opened the bag with noisemakers. Another option would be to make your own noisemakers craft.

At 5:00, we found Athens,and thenthe boys played with the Silly String they found in the bag.

At 6:00, we found Rome, Italy and ate an Italian dinner complete with antipasto, garlic bread, lasagna and salad. Another option would be to find Munich, Germany and make Marzipan pigs.

From 2012.

At 7:00, we found Madrid, Spain and ate 12 frozen grapes, which we threaded on skewers, dipped in grape juice and rolled in sugar before putting in the freezer. (I put the sparking juice in the fridge for later.)

At 8:00, we found the Azores and had our dessert of a Hot Chocolate Bar and Muddy Buddies.

At 9:00, we found Rio De Janeiro and the bag had Poppers in it.

In later years, as the little boys were allowed to stay up later and later, we added additional cities, bags and activities.

At 10:00, we found Sao Paulo, Brazil we turned off all the lights and put on the Glow in the Dark bracelets found in that bag.

From 2014

At 11:00, we found Caracas, Venezuela, and drank and Sparkling Juice.

At 12:00, we brought in our New Year by popping balloons.

More about Around the World New Year's Eve traditions can be found here and here.

I LOOOOOVE this idea, and need to remember to steal it for next year. Like the others I vaguely remember you posting this last year, and I probably said the same thing then. Sigh, this year I was just in do nothing fancy mode between Christmas and New Year's.